„Fuck all this sand." A voice muttered
"Which God thought to themselves that we needed a desert as terribly hot as this one in the universe?" Alaric cursed out aloud.
It had been a week since he arrived in this world.
He called it the disgusting world of endless heat — with full hatred.
Although he returned to the wizarding world whenever he couldn't stand it anymore and needed to fulfill his duties, he still hated the place.
One the one hand, because at day it was terribly hot and terribly cold at night. On the other hand, because he felt incredibly at ease mentally.
Ignoring the heat.
He was just letting his mind flow freely in the covered shade of his abode. A heightened rock formation that was more than large enough for him to feel at ease. It was barely 20 meters from where he started out in the world.
But unlike the world of Douluo Dalu, he had no desire to travel far and beyond here.
Firstly, because he knew that it would take forever to go trough the desert, always returning to his home world to restock on water and recovering from the heat.
Secondly because this desert was dangerous. Scorpions were running around in a lot of spaces and Alaric felt like getting stung by a normal scorpion would let him die sooner of shame than the poison it would inject.
And don't even get him started on that, the 2nd day that he arrived he nearly got stung by one. The only reason he lived was that the idiotic thing tried to sting him through his leather boots and not getting through the leather.
After that he instantly killed it with his hammer and went on a shopping spree in London to get stuff to make his hideout scorpion-safe. A lot of damn insect nets and plastic mats for the ground. He didn't even count them but just looking at them right now, there were probably more than 50 hung around.
Then again, staying here was better than whatever existed outside.
Going back to his outpost, he didn't just create it because he felt mentally better. No, the real reason was that besides that, his spiritual power aka. The power of the mind grew slightly while he was here. Something he never experienced beforehand.
So, these days he went to school in the original universe, went to physically train in Douluo Dalu and did mental training and researching of the Axiom Vault in this hellish landscape.
"Urgh, I'm bored. Let's check out what's going on outside." Alaric muttered in a lazy tone.
Taking some binoculars, he started looking around for the few traces of the little wildlife that tried to survive this place. Whenever he did that, he felt like a biologist looking at nigh-extinct species that would never be seen by the general public.
"Woah, how cute" he muttered under his breath with a smile. Words that he would never publicly say, for fear of losing his own self interpreted sense of manliness.
His view lingering on a teeny tiny desert mouse with quite long ears.
"Man in the future I need one of those as a pet. I mean just look at how adorable it is." he laughed lightly.
That was until the rumbling started.
"Not again. The one time I find something halfway worthwhile on this damn planet…" He thought.
It was the 3rd time this week that he experienced an earthquake.
"Man, I have never experienced an earthquake during both of my lives and here it's already the 3rd one in total. In a single week."
With by now practiced ease he went outside the cave. Caution towards the possibility of a stone falling on his head and killing him.
Again, another terrible way to die.
The ease in his body language freezing. He looked not toward the usual opening, but to the other side of the horizon — and froze.
"Are you shitting me?" he asked himself out aloud.
In the distance, the desert was moving as if there was suddenly a small mountain range running along the horizon.
His mind blitzing with thoughts faster than ever before.
No wonder I feel mentally clearer here.
No wonder this desert is a killing zone.
No wonder that there are constant tremors here.
"And thank god I didn't come to the terrible conclusion of leaving this place." The last part came out aloud.
Arrakis
The main focus point of the Dune franchise. A desert planet that was a pure hell where nobody would set a foot on except for one thing.
Spice
A brownish powdered substance that gives humans incredibly potent mental faculties.
Its effects being
Heightened awareness,
Greater vitality,
A longer lifespan,
possibly more in terms of mental powers under certain conditions,
And it most importantly gives the ability to lead a spaceship for space travel.
The most valuable commodity in this universe.
"Thank god I didn't run into some Fremen."
The local population that hated all outsiders to an extreme as the rest of the universe didn't give a single thought to them and simply wanted to extract spice out of the desert sand. Most people being killed on site by them.
He sat down slowly, the binoculars falling into his lap. The shaking continued for a few more seconds, then settled. A few rocks on the side shook but held their place.
Alaric let out a slow breath. Barely having calmed down.
"Arrakis… shit."
He had watched the Dune movies. Once. A long time ago. Enough to remember the important parts.
Spice. Worms. Water is life. The Bene Gesserit.
But most of all? The danger of being seen.
Now the pieces clicked.
The mental clarity, the subtle increase in spiritual power.
Spice wasn't just a drug. It was a metaphysical amplifier. A psychic accelerant.
And if his own energy could be influenced by its mere presence in the air—what would direct ingestion do?
His fingers twitched. Not with fear. With temptation.
"No," he muttered, standing again. "Not yet."
If this truly was that world, he'd have to be smart. Precise. Careful beyond measure.
The Fremen could probably kill him with a single word and vanish before his corpse hit the sand. The Empire's current Holder of the planet wouldn't be kinder, even the house of Atreides.
And the sandworms… well, those were simply unkillable. The all-devouring gods of the desert.
But that didn't mean this place wasn't worth it.
His eyes scanned the distant tremor trail again.
"Guess I'll need to learn how to walk without rhythm."
He chuckled dryly, though his mind was already racing ahead. Spice had to be collected. Stored. Studied. But only in unnoticed doses. Any serious harvesting would attract attention, and attention was exactly what he had sworn to avoid. But collecting enough for himself shouldn't bring an army onto him.
He pulled the cloth tighter around his face.
The desert wind had picked up again, carrying with it a faint reddish shimmer that now he understood — was not dust, but something more.
A soft whisper echoed in the vault — a rotating glyph he hadn't seen before, marked with spiral patterns that matched the spice-induced fractal hallucinations described in certain footnotes of the original works texts.
"Of course," he murmured, "of course the Vault likes this place too."
He turned to head back into the cave. He'd need better shielding, filters, and a solid strategy before he could start pulling anything. But the greed had already taken hold in his heart.
For now, he'd sit. Train. Observe.
And when the time came to get more — not even a shadow would see him coming.